Deep Moat Grange

by S. R. Crockett

"'I can play the fiddle!' he would answer, jeering at me.

"Yet, because there was no other money, and I could not let my sisters (who at least had done no wrong) suffer, I used what he brought. For neither, I was sure (and the thought comforted me), had Jeremy done wrong, because the mad can do no crime. The worst the law can do, is only to shut them up. And in the meantime the money was most convenient."

Here she paused, and a sort of groan ran all round the courthouse, as the meaning and scope of the woman's revelation began to dawn upon the packed audience. Aphra Orrin, being in her senses, had employed the madman, her brother, to murder right and left that the wants of her brood might be met!

There arose a hoarse mingled shout: "Tear her to pieces!" before which, however, Aphra never blanched. But the sheriff was on his feet in a moment. The fiscal commanded silence, ordering the court officer to apprehend all who disobeyed. For the wise lawyer could see well ahead, and knew that as yet they were only at the beginning of mysteries.

When silence was restored Euphrasia Orrin continued without losing a moment, neither amazed nor alarmed at the manifestation.

"At Bristol I perceived that all this would certainly end in an unpleasant discovery—yes, unpleasant" (she repeated the word as if in response to the threatening murmurs!). "I was not responsible for my poor brother, but I thought it would be well to remove him to a place where there were no docks and fewer temptations. I bethought myself of Leeds. We went there, but somehow Jeremy never took to Leeds. He wandered off by himself to London, associating with horse-coupers and gipsies by the way. Suddenly he disappeared. I heard no more of him till at our famine-bare garret a letter arrived containing a hundred pounds in Bank of England notes—and an address." Miss Orrin put her hand into a trim little reticule which was attached to her waist, and drew out a single sheet of paper, on which was written in a sprawling hand: "H. Stennis, Pattern Designer and Weaver, Burnside Cottage, Breckonside, Bordershire, N.B."

At this moment I noticed that Mr. Ablethorpe had for the first time left the side of the speaker—though Mr. De la Poer continued to stand on attention, his shoulder almost touching the dark veil which fell away to one side of Aphra's face, and threw into relief her determined chin. Mr. Ablethorpe was speaking to my father. My astonishment was still greater when I saw my father rise quietly and leave the courthouse. With a crook of his finger he summoned Rob Kingsman, and, without either of them paying the least attention to me, both left the room. Then I was certain that my father did not wish to attract attention by calling me away. Perhaps, also, he wanted first-hand evidence of what happened after he was gone. Anyway, he did not put himself at all out of the way at the thought of leaving me in the lurch at Longtown with the night falling. It was, of course, different from what it had been before the burning of Deep Moat Grange. People began to go the roads freely again.

Once more Mr. Ablethorpe took up his position. The sheriff had stopped taking notes, so absorbed was he in what he heard. As for the fiscal, he had never attempted to take any. He was enjoying the situation. This confession in open court was a thing unknown in his experience, and he was chiefly afraid lest the sheriff, little accustomed to this sort of thing, and probably anxious to get home for dinner, should cut short the sederunt.

"At this point," said Mr. Ablethorpe, who in a way assumed the position of counsel for his strange penitent. "I would put into your lordship's hands papers of some importance. They came from Dr. Hector, some of them, and some out of the safe in the cellar of the Grange."

The sheriff was not in the best of humours.